Due Diligence

My ex-husband serves in an EQ Presidency, and they’ve been trying to make short, get acquainted kinds of visits to quorum members. One of his appointment-setting e-mails received this (tongue in cheek) response:

How short? Five minutes, ten minutes, more minutes? Will you and Jonathan remove your shoes when you enter our house? (Having served a mission in Canada, I assume I need not ask concerning Steve.) Will you all be wearing fresh socks so as to not offend when you remove your shoes upon entering our house? Will there be a spiritual message, a religious message, a mingled message or none of the preceding? Any other messages? If yes, please elaborate. Are you going to try to make us feel bad about not measuring-up to certain Ward, Stake or personal goals or failing to effectively take charge of an EQ committee that one may have been unilaterally assigned to chair? If you do try, how concerned should we be that you will succeed? (We don’t like feeling bad.) Do any of you (or a family member) have Swine flu or other communicable disease (including those largely ignored by the media, such as the Ebola virus)? Do any of you (or a family member) have lice or any other parasite? (A negative response re: lice is non-negotiable, though we may hear you out on other parasites.) Will you each still be fasting? If so, do you mind if we eat in front of you? On a related note, will you be bringing treats? If yes, store bought or home made?

Provided your answers are acceptable to me and Denise (consulting as equals, but with only Denise having actual voting rights), I think 2:30pm on Sunday should work fine.

Kulturblog

Time to update Susan’s post from August of 07. “They say that these are not the best of times, But they’re the only times I’ve ever known. And I believe there is a time for meditation In cathedrals of our own.” -Billy Joel, Summer Highland Falls

NOTE: This is an essay I wrote as an undergraduate at the University of Utah almost thirty years ago. I am republishing it here as a remembrance of my favorite professor, Mark Strand, upon the occasion of his passing. Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live… […]